Marvel: I am Iron Man

Tri-wing Building, Nick Fury's office.

"Hydra—yes, the Hydra from World War II—has never died. It still exists, and has been parasitizing within S.H.I.E.L.D. for so many years, growing incredibly powerful. And I am a part of it."

Fury narrowed his eyes and listened as he continued.

"The reason I'm telling you this is because I inadvertently learned something that I shouldn't know in my position... God, I really didn't mean to pry, it was just a mistake in data exchange... But in any case, I learned something I shouldn't know."

Within Hydra, anyone who knows information beyond their own level is only... well...

He didn't continue, but it was already very clear.

He filmed this because he accidentally learned some information that was classified even within Hydra.

Sitwell was by nature an opportunist, lacking the loyalty expected of a die-hard member of the organization. He feared that knowing the secrets would lead to the organization silencing him. Therefore, he recorded these things in hopes of defecting to Fury in exchange for protection.

"Actually, I hadn't decided whether to do this when I recorded this content, but I set it to send automatically if I didn't do anything for more than two hours."

Sitwell continued speaking in the video.

"So if I'm already dead by the time you see this, then please, Chief Fury, for the sake of the clues I left you, at least protect my family..."

The bald man in the video was crying his eyes out, clearly very upset.

Upon seeing this, Nick Fury looked down and fiddled with a black cell phone in his hand.

This is the cell phone that the bald guy mentioned in the video.

Fury had already sent one of his most trusted agents to the scene, where he found the phone behind the ceiling of the bathroom in Sitwell and secretly brought it to Fury.

Even Coulson, who had just come to report, was unaware of this matter.

Next, he will arrange for trusted technicians to verify the authenticity of the video and determine whether there are any signs of forgery or splicing/editing.

If not...

Fury stared at the phone and saw his own bald head clearly reflected on the lock screen.

This phone contains crucial data that could revolutionize the landscape of S.H.I.E.L.D.

...

Stark House.

Down in the lab, Tony dried his wet hair with a towel, stared at the Winter Soldier pointing his gun at him, and tilted his head.

After examining it for a few seconds, Tony suddenly spoke up, "If you look closely, there are still some flaws; it has a slight CGI feel. But it should be enough to fool most people."

Jarvis said, "I think so too, sir. While there are still areas for polishing and improvement, it is undoubtedly a masterpiece."

As soon as he finished speaking, the Winter Soldier holding the gun contorted and his image became distorted. Then, the Winter Soldier vanished completely, transforming into a small, black-painted drone hovering in the laboratory.

This is the same drone that appeared in "Spider-Man: Far From Home".

The drones in the movie were also Stark products, but the one Tony is using now is an older model than the one in the movie, a prototype. However, it already has a trial version of "dual-structure" technology, which is the prototype of the holographic projection used by the villain Mysterio in the movie.

The Winter Soldier we just saw was generated by him using a drone.

As mentioned before, while current technology may not be able to create a massive apocalyptic scene like the one in the movie "Far From Home" that could fool the whole world, it is entirely possible to project a small, single target.

So the one who went to shoot the Hydra agent in Sitwell last night wasn't the real Winter Soldier, but a fake one created by Tony. The one that actually fired the shot was this drone.

However, the video footage of Sitwell's self-narration that was left for Fury was not fictional, but genuine.

Tony's method was quite simple. After the drone killed Baldy, he used the drone again to recreate Baldy's image, and then forged this video. Forensic experts usually only check whether the video has been spliced ​​or edited, but if they did it this way, the video would be completely real, only the Baldy in the video would be fake, and the flaws might not be detected.

Furthermore, the deliberate exposure of the Winter Soldier's image further confirms the credibility of the claim that "the mole was silenced by Hydra."

After all, the Winter Soldier is a well-known, unlucky guy in Hydra. This guy, who has been repeating the cycle of "waking up to kill, brainwashing, and freezing back into the freezer" for half a century, perfectly embodies what it means to have "the re-employment difficulties of a century-old popsicle".

Furthermore, the Winter Soldier was designed to obey only Pierce's orders. If the Winter Soldier were to take action, even the other Hydra traitors within S.H.I.E.L.D. might actually believe the theory that "Sitwell attempted to jump into the water and was silenced by the boss."

The so-called spare encrypted phone left behind by the Sitwell agents was, of course, fake.

After all, Baldy never actually knew anything he shouldn't have known, and no one in Hydra ever said they wanted to silence him. The contents of the encrypted phone were also fabricated by Tony.

Of course, it would be pointless to fabricate something too sensational or something that could be verified instantly.

Nick Fury, in particular, is a suspicious person. If you simply list everything out for him in detail, this naturally rebellious scoundrel might find it harder to believe you.

So, to make it all seem more real, he had to design it like a puzzle game. The puzzle couldn't be too difficult to solve, nor too easy to feel like an insult to one's intelligence. And the ultimate prize for solving the puzzle was the identity of Pierce, the former head of S.H.I.E.L.D.

So Tony fabricated some false clues to guide S.H.I.E.L.D.'s investigation. Of course, if they were all completely fake, it would be meaningless. So the brilliance lies in the fact that while the clues and information were fabricated, the direction of the investigation was entirely genuine.

For example, the supposedly top-secret S.H.I.E.L.D. Insight project was actually hijacked by Hydra from the very beginning; or the supposedly WWII-era Hydra programmer Dr. Zola's data ascended to godhood and is now a digital ghost, partying inside the S.H.I.E.L.D. servers...

This is also one of the advantages of having read the script. Knowing the outcome beforehand, all clues rely on fabrication, and all reasoning relies on concoction; as long as the result matches, it's fine.

The existence of Dr. Zola, whose numbers have skyrocketed, is also key evidence in the movie "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" that confirms Captain America and Black Widow's belief that Hydra is still alive and that there is a mole within the entire S.H.I.E.L.D. team. This must have been quite shocking even for Fury.

In this way, Tony has essentially accelerated the outbreak of the final battle between S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra. It's foreseeable that for a long time to come, both S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra will be overwhelmed and won't have much time to cause trouble.

As for how to catch the mole, that's Fury's own problem.

To be honest, in the famous scene of Avengers: Endgame in my previous life, when Captain America said "Hail Hydra" and the whole elevator full of Hydras were completely stunned, Tony had already had a bold idea.

If all Hydra agents were this capable, wouldn't it be obvious whoever responded to a call of "Hail Hydra" if they simply shouted "Hail Hydra" to each S.H.I.E.L.D. agent?